ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the relationship between play, health and the environment, using the concepts of playful setting and playscape to contrast natural and built environments. It discusses the role of the environment in shaping opportunities for play and playfulness, while acknowledging that sometimes it is just time and space that are needed for play to flow freely. The chapter explains how enhanced environments can impact on people’s behaviors, attitudes and perceptions, particularly when they incorporate elements of play and playfulness. It examines the impact of how and where we live on the public health agenda. The global adoption of the healthy settings approach, and the widespread acceptance of the significance of green space, has been matched by the growth of a worldwide movement for play, and the notion of the ‘playful setting’ as conducive to health and wellbeing. The natural environment offers many possibilities for play and, as such, represents a ‘natural playscape’.
